Wednesday, 22 April 2015

Shanghai China - Day 1

Thursday April 16

Today as we disembarked we had to go through Chinese Immigration control, but it flowed smoothly and the officials made a real effort to be friendly whilst remaining efficient. There was a shuttle bus organized to take us to Huangpu Garden, which would normally only be a 5 minute drive, but due to roadworks it worked out about 10 - 15 minutes. Also, the roadworks meant it wasn't practical to walk to the Bund, even though our ship was docked less than a kilometre away on the Huangpu River. The view from our cabin was directly across the River to the Oriental Pearl TV tower so we had a spectacular view of the Pudong skyline.

View from our cabin window

We strolled along the River front, taking in the fabulous sights on both sides of the River. There was another cruise ship docked behind us, so there were a lot of tourists in town! It was a cool morning, but with only a light wind it was a bit smoggy and grey.

At the People 's Heroes monument with our ship close by

Next up was a visit to the famous Peace Hotel which was the hot spot in the 1920s and 1930s and is now a Fairmont hotel so it's very swish. We visited it on our last trip to Shanghai and love the history and decor there so thought it well worth a visit again. Even the Men's toilet had a chandelier in it!

Noelle in the lobby of the Peace Hotel

We continued our walk along Nanjing Road, which turns into a pedestrian mall with big stores either side and hustlers trying to sell you selfie sticks and roller skates to put on your shoes. We decided a coffee and pastry were needed while we updated what we could on the internet. Alas though, Google, Instagram and Facebook don't work in mainland China, so no updates for a few days!

Nanjing Road in spring

Our objective was to get to the Shanghai Museum in Peoples Park. We were very careful to obey the traffic signals when crossing the roads. There are a lot more cars than motorbikes here and the authorities have built pedestrian underpasses to get you across major roads safely. The architecture in Shanghai is very modern and quite spectacular so there are great photo opportunities everywhere.

People's Park

We had heard fantastic things about the museum here and we weren't disappointed. We spent about 4 hours there looking at the Chinese bronzes, ceramics, seals, jade items, paintings, calligraphy, furniture, currency and stamps, and a display of ethnic minorities' arts and crafts. Some of the pieces were over 3,000 years old, and the craftsmanship over the ages has been remarkable - some of the pieces would easily suit a modern apartment today. The museum itself was quite modern, and we loved the design of the atrium.

Shanghai Museum atrium
A bronze axe with turquoise inlaid pattern
Magnificent painting

We had worked up an appetite by this stage, so we headed back toward the River taking in some different neighborhoods as we went. It seemed like they had all the hair and beauty shops together, then came bookstores, followed by art and stationary stores. We finally found a restaurant with dumplings on display, so we joined a lot of locals to get our fix of Shanghai dumplings. It was a great choice and kept us going as we continued our walk back to the ship. By now the lights were starting to come on in the buildings and along the Bund adding to the atmosphere as we enjoyed our walk in the cool night air. The wind had picked up so it was clearer than earlier in the day.

Shanghai at night

Garden Bridge looking back along the Bund

We could see our ship lit up at its berth, but due to the roadworks we couldn't walk directly to it, so again we wandered through some very non-tourist areas but finally arrived back safely, much to Noelle's delight. We had definitely walked off our dumplings so had main course and dessert on board before heading to the show that was a local troupe of Chinese acrobats. They were amazing, especially a young girl who could do just about anything any of the other acrobats could do. She was so tiny that her tights just hung on her legs instead of being a tight fit but she had amazing strength and was obviously double-jointed. This show capped off a fantastic day, and we have another full day in port tomorrow to see more of this amazing city.

View from our cabin at night

 

 

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